


someone will come running

by taizi



Series: years and years [2]
Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Families of Choice, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Healing, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-13
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-09-17 14:20:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16976187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taizi/pseuds/taizi
Summary: His voice is hoarse, and whether it’s from disuse or emotion, or a footprint of that terrible grief, Mikey can’t be sure. So he squeezes Leo tight when it’s his turn for a goodbye hug; hoping to impress the feeling of his arms around Leo’s shoulders in a way that will keep, so Leo doesn’t get lonely, or forget his family while he’s gone.





	someone will come running

None of them are comfortable letting Leo go alone, but he’s so quietly stubborn about the whole thing when for so long he’s been little more than a ghost around the lair that they don’t have the heart to deny him, either.

“Promise me you’ll keep in touch,” Donnie says, stern for all the softness in his eyes. “I’m not above following you across the Atlantic if I think for a second that you’re screening my calls.”

“Of course,” Leo says, maybe too easily. His voice is hoarse, and whether it’s from disuse or emotion, or a footprint of that terrible grief, Mikey can’t be sure. So he squeezes Leo _tight_ when it’s his turn for a goodbye hug; hoping to impress the feeling of his arms around Leo’s shoulders in a way that will keep, so Leo doesn’t get lonely, or forget his family while he’s gone.

Maybe it’s something they should be doing as a family – returning father’s ashes to his homeland, laying him to rest with Shen. But Mikey doesn’t want to go.

“Is that wrong?” he asks Raph, a few hours after Leo and the precious urn have gone – and he’s twenty-one years old, but his voice comes out so small he might as well be twelve. Waiting for recrimination, but all that happens is a gentling of Raph’s expression that really isn’t a surprise to anyone.

Raph slings an arm around his shoulders, a few inches shorter these days but no less solid and strong than he’s always been, and Mikey leans into his rough brother’s side the way he’s done his whole life.

“’Course not,” Raph tells him shortly. “Father wouldn’t want us to drop everything for him, would he?”

He wouldn’t, Mikey concedes, lightened. And they know that for a fact. He was sick for so long they had more than enough time to make peace and say goodbye.

“Leo’s doing this for himself,” Raph adds, not unkindly, “and if that’s what he’s gotta do to be okay again, then that’s what he’s gotta do. But the rest of us – we got shit to do _here_.”

And they do. The lair flooded just a couple weeks ago in a bad, bad way; the grimy waters effectively stealing their home away in a matter of dark, stormy hours. It would have broken a sixteen-year-old Michelangelo’s heart, but it wasn’t as hard as it could have been.

Homes are transitory, he remembers father saying once.

They’re settling into the pretty loop station that sits abandoned under busy Manhattan (and Mikey is so glad _this_ contender for The Lair 2.0 won over that old water treatment plant in the Bronx, because that place gave him the _creeps_ ) and Casey, April and Woody make the transition easier than it would have been without them, and Mikey still has his brothers and his cat and fond memories of the place he used to live.

Leo’s the only one struggling to keep his head above water. Mikey misses him the moment he’s gone, and ignores the tiny voice in the back of his brain that questions whether or not Leo will ever come back.

“I’ve barely been gone a day, Don,” Leo says by way of greeting the first time Donnie calls him, and he sounds scratchy and tired but happy to hear from them, and Mikey clusters against Donnie’s shoulder to shout his own hello. “Hi, Mikey,” he adds fondly. Mikey’s heart swells two sizes, and he beams so radiantly at Donnie that Donnie’s smile back is a knee-jerk reaction. “Wait. Isn’t it close to two a.m. there? What are you still doing up? You have class in the morning.”

“Yeahhh, _online_. All I have to do is a discussion board, anyway, who cares. Tell me about the trip so far!”

And so he does. And maybe Mikey’s imagining it, but Leo sounds a little lighter already, like just getting out and getting away was enough to seep some of those sad shadows out of his soul. It hurts, just a tiny bit, that Leo had to leave them to feel better, but mostly Mikey’s _glad_.

Leo calls again when he arrives at Karai and Shinigami’s little apartment in Tokyo, and then they all get a mass text from Karai’s number which turns out to be a selfie she took of herself, her girlfriend, and her little brother, all mashed cheek-to-cheek. There are dark circles under Leo’s eyes, but the blue of them is bright, and his smile is a crooked flash of teeth.

“Thank you, Karai,” April whispers. Mikey leans his head on her shoulder, feels Woody wrap an arm around them both, and shares the sentiment with all his heart.

They don’t know how long he’ll be away – they didn’t really press him for details before he left, afraid to press him too hard for _anything_ since the world seems too heavy for him anymore and even a harsh word feels like enough to send him spiraling into pieces. So days turn to months, and Mikey _misses_ him. There’s a Leo-shaped absence in the new lair they build out of the loop station, and it won’t really be home until he’s back.

Still, they have movie marathons, and Taco Tuesdays, and cram sessions when finals week rolls around. They celebrate Casey’s birthday, and Donnie and April’s third anniversary, and fill the lair with string lights and secondhand furniture, and Mikey falls asleep most nights in the warm cocoon of Woody’s arms.

Still, they settle into life around the hole where their big brother should be, and it’s a little scary. That it can be so normal, so functional, without him.

And then, when it’s been seven months and some change, Leo sends a text asking _‘whoever’s not busy’_ if they have time to talk on Skype. The result is a scrambled flurry as everyone present – which is everyone except Casey, who’s going to be _ticked_ he got suckered into a double shift at work when he finds out – bolts into Donnie’s lab and clusters around his array of flatscreen monitors. And Leo looks a little startled to see almost the entire clan looking back at him, but it’s a startle that turns into surprised laughter, and Mikey nearly swallows his heart at the sound.

“I wanted you to meet someone,” Leo says, sounding so much like his old self that it’s almost painful to hear. He tilts the screen of his phone to the side and his siblings are greeted to a wealth of downy white fur and dark, almond-shaped eyes. “This is Usagi,” is Leo’s helpful voice-over, and each word is shaped like a wide smile, and whoever Usagi is, Mikey _loves_  him.

“It’s nice to meet you,” Donnie says, and nothing in his expression gives away how his hands shake under the computer desk. Raph wraps an arm around him that manages to look casual, and none of the brightness in Leo’s eyes goes away for even a second in the precious handful of hours that they get to see his face. 

When he finally comes home, he takes them by surprise. There’s no warning when the hatch opens and a familiar figure slides down the ladder. One moment, for all Mikey knew, Leo was an ocean away – and now here he is, sliding a worn bag off his shoulder, eyes wide as he takes in their home.

It was dirty and dusty when he left and now it’s warmly lit and the stained glass windows shine. He only gets a few seconds to admire the place, because a few seconds is all it takes for his family to process what they’re seeing – and then he’s got armfuls of siblings to hug, and cheeks and foreheads to kiss, and tears to scrub away as deftly as if he’s ten years old again, tending hurt feelings and skinned knees with all the proficiency of someone born to the job.

Usagi looks a little out of place, but only for a moment, because Mikey is quick to cross the room to him. And Leo must have told the rabbit all about his little brother beforehand, since Usagi’s face gentles as Mikey comes near, and he’s ready for it when Mikey throws his arms around Usagi’s waist and buries his face in the tired fabric of a well-loved kimono and holds on for all he’s worth. 

There’s a whole world of things Mikey wants to say to him, this stranger who isn’t a stranger at all, who found Leo and brought him back where he belongs – but all Mikey can manage, for right now at least, is “Hi,” and “Thank you,” and “Welcome home.”


End file.
